El Comercio Peru
Havana, December 10 (RHC)-- There will be no classic in the semifinals of the Qatar 2022 World Cup. When everyone was giving Brazil as the overwhelming favorite to lift the golden trophy, Argentina has saved America in the Cup.
Scaloni put a three-man defense on the field and left a Netherlands team unable to come up with answers to their own proposal.
In the match of equals, Argentina had better pieces and better ball handling. They also had Messi. It is very difficult not to win when you have a genius who invents a pass with luxury and glitter for the spectators on TV, although invisible for the Dutch defense.
Nahuel Molina conceded half a goal to Noppert in the 34th minute, and he scored. Then, in the 72nd minute, Messi himself made it 2-0 with a penalty, after taking advantage of Dumfries' clumsy challenge on Acuna.
If this did not mean a dunk for the Argentines, it was because Scaloni did what he had to do: tie the game with less than 10 minutes to play. This time, however, he lost too much power and punch.
La Naranja, not as mechanical as before, pulled out all the stops and was not willing to go out like that, through the back door. They went for the kill or be killed and did not fall into the infamous comfort of surrendering their weapons.
Wouter Weghorst gave a warning of a goal in the 82nd minute and then, in the last play of the match, took advantage of a controversial free kick near the box. His second goal came from a play created in the laboratory.
With so much dread, the Argentines did not look for any grandiloquent headlines in the extra time. They didn't have much more than Di Maria on the bench to try. The tulips also bet on penalties: anything would do after being one second away from a bye.
The penalty shootout favored a plethoric Dibu Martinez, but the Europeans went out with a vengeance. Perhaps this is the most common soccer cliché, but it is also what best defines what happened.
On the other side of the day, Brazil failed to deliver. The pentacampeona suffered paralysis against an orderly and untroubled Croatia, as if they were good at playing overtime.
Modric deserves a monument in Zagreb. Nobody supports the dignity of the Balkan team in a better way, nor knows how to suffer like him in matches they do not dominate.
Brazil had it easier. With control of the ball, you suffer less. It is also less tiring to manage the threads of the match, although it is desperate to run into the same wall a thousand times.
So much desperate this time that Tite pointed to the men (Vinicius and Rafinha) and did not mess with the tactical approach. He was trying to get different results by doing the same thing: big mistake.
Thus they reached extra time: the Vatreni suffered and the Scratch proposed and gave away the trouble until Neymar changed the script at 105", with a goal to keep for a long time.
